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On 28 April in Vilnius, the memorial plaque was unveiled to Abraham Sutzkever, famous Litvak writer, former prisoner of the Vilna Ghetto, who worked in the Vilna Ghetto Theatre, and later became a Jewish anti-Fascist partisan.

Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania Asta Skaisgirytė Liauškienė, who participated in the solemn ceremony, stressed that A.Sutzkever’s creative work, the scope and suggestibility of which can be compared to the Icelandic Saga, testifies not only to the tragedy of Lithuanian Jews, but also to the strength of their spirit.

“This great poet of the lost Vilnius described in his poetry not only the horrors of the Holocaust, but also his will to resist the evil and evergreen hope. Let’s open this modest memorial plaque today, which will be another landmark for all of us, reminding us of the meaningful life and poetry of this tough Vilna Ghetto fighter,” Vice-Minister A.Skaisgirytė Liauškienė said.

The solemn ceremony in memory of A.Sutzkever was attended by the poet’s two daughters and a granddaughter, who came with a group of Litvaks from Israel, Vilnius City Mayor Artūras Zuokas, Chairman of the Lithuanian Jewish Community Simonas Alperavičius and Head of the Association of Vilna Jews in Israel Miriam Kantor.

A.Sutzkever was born in 1913 in Smorgon and from 1920 he lived in Vilnius, where he studied literature at the University, and was one of the co-founders of the Yung Vilne (Young Vilna) group, a dynamic literary group. The creative work of this writer and poet, reflecting the tragic history of the Vilnius Jews in the 20th century, has won international recognition and has been translated into many languages. A.Sutzkever’s poetry was translated by his long-time friend Czesław Miłosz. This year, the translation into the Lithuanian language of A.Sutzkever’s book “Of the Vilna Ghetto” (“Fun vilner geto”) was presented at the Jerusalem Book Fair.

After the Second World War, the poet rescued bits and pieces of the Jewish heritage from the ruins of Vilnius, which became the keystone of the Jewish Museum. After moving to Israel, A.Sutzkever aimed to preserve his native Yiddish language and collected the remaining documents of the Institute for Jewish Research in Vilnius (YIVO). In 1946, he was a witness during the Nuremberg trial process.

On 16 February 2008, at the decree of the President of Lithuania A.Sutzkever was awarded the Cross of the Knight of the Order of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas. The poet died in 2010 in Israel.